When instructor Zaki Lisha came to De Anza College as an instructor in the photography department in 1974, there was no film department on campus. De Anza hired him to start one.
It’s now “the largest and most successful film and television department in the California Community College system.”
“I was privileged to take a part in starting the film department,” says Lisha. When he started the first general class in film, everything about the department was new and difficult, he says. There weren’t enough students, staff or qualified facilities to support the program. Yet, the challenge of the situation is what Lisha found fun. When something is difficult, he says, he is more determined to get it done. And get it done is exactly what he did, as the department has grown to one of the top film departments in the nation.
Lisha emigrated from Egypt while he was in middle school. He spent two years at University of California Berkeley, where he discovered his passion for film. He transferred to the University of Southern California, where he studied professional film and earned his bachelor’s degree, then went on to earn a master’s degree in cinema from San Francisco State University.
He’s never stopped perusing his passion and the constantly changing film industry is what keeps his fascination with film alive.
Lisha enjoys hearing students’ ideas and seeing the ideas turn into films. He encourages students to allow themselves to make mistakes; after all, he says, filmmaking is a very complex art form. “You work on it and then improve it,” he says. “Then all the sudden you realize the power you have on affecting the audience.”
Lisha enjoys photography and traveling, and has an interest in World War II studies. He is interested in documentaries and books about the Vichy regime – the government of France in the early 1940s. He’s been honored as a Fellow for the Faculty Seminar at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and serves as a judge for several film competitions. Students describe him as a great story teller and one of the most inspiring, encouraging instructors they’ve had.
If an instructor can be judged by his students’ successes, check out the contestants each year at San Jose’s Cinequest Film Festival – one of the top 10 festivals in the world, according to the Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide. De Anza students’ films have been showcased at film festivals, such as San Jose Cinequest, since 2001.